


Grove of Familiars

by BarracudaHeart



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Aging, Brotherly Bonding, Character Death, Familiars, Gen, Immortality, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-31
Updated: 2017-05-31
Packaged: 2018-11-07 05:52:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11052657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BarracudaHeart/pseuds/BarracudaHeart
Summary: He was grateful he had a second chance at life. A chance to live and take nothing for granted. But he didn’t want to lose his humanity for it. He wasn’t like Steven. He wasn’t conditioned to be between two worlds. He was born a human, he died a human, and he was resurrected as a human...right?





	Grove of Familiars

**Author's Note:**

> This is a story based on the Wanted special! God, I love Lars.

Steven remembered when Lars first came to him with questions, only a month after he returned to Earth. 

 

Questions about life. Questions about himself. Questions about immortality.

 

Well, Steven wasn’t sure if he could answer that last one. He didn’t exactly know if that was actually a thing Lars would have to deal with.

 

“I hardly need to eat or sleep, and my heart beats so slow. I don’t even know what that means,” Lars had muttered, “Am I just a zombie now, or am I just living off your magic?”

 

Steven really didn’t know. He told Lars not to worry about it.

 

Lars just became more sleepless.

 

* * *

 

 

Immortality was not a gift that Lars wanted to receive. It wasn’t out of a disdain for life, but out of a fear that soon he’d be alone.

 

He would never grow up. He would never be able to love someone and marry them and have a family, because they would all die before he even would age unless Steven somehow revived them too. He wasn’t even sure if he could have children of his own in his new state.

 

Steven had told him he found his lion in the desert. And he had told him of the history book on his mother, written centuries before, and how it contained anecdotes of her amongst a whole pride of lions.

 

Lars had screwed his eyes shut and remained silent, keeping a hand over his eyes. He shook his head over and over, in disbelief at his predicted fate.

 

“Steven,” he whispered, looking up, glittering pink tears at the corner of his eyes, a hand partially covering his quivering mouth.

 

_ “I don’t want to live forever.” _

 

* * *

 

Not wanting Lars to be depressed, Steven had initially tried to cheer him up with the prospects of being immortal. He would be able to stay with his new friends, the Off Colors, he would be able to stay young and not worry about graying, and nobody would be able to tell him to act his age.

 

Lars didn’t know how to best express or explain his anger about the situation.

 

He was grateful he had a second chance at life. A chance to live and take nothing for granted. But he didn’t want to lose his humanity for it. He wasn’t like Steven. He wasn’t conditioned to be between two worlds. He was born a human, he died a human, and he was resurrected as a human...right? And he didn’t want the humans he loved and grew up with to grow up without him and die while he stayed the same.

 

He wanted to experience life just like a human should. But if he was subjected to this fate, so be it, he surmised with defeat.

 

Steven wasn’t one to give up so easily though. He was willing to figure out the truth if it would ease Lars’ worries, or make the reality settle in faster.

 

* * *

 

 

The trip to the desert took over a day, but this time Steven had better stamina built up to handle the heat and climate these days. Lars was sweating like a pig and needed at least four bottles of water, but he was stable enough to travel while riding on top of Lion. The animal didn’t seem at all bothered with the land, having been discovered here.

 

Steven had asked Lion for information about his mother and how Lion knew her, and the animal was quick to lead him along. 

 

They had reached the same spot where Steven had found the tape addressed to Nora, and immediately they began digging through all the collected stuff for information.

 

Lars had found cheap old scrapbooks full of cheesy photos of Greg Universe and Rose Quartz, and wondered how long ago the gem had last visited this place before. Was this place just for storage?

 

When he found a book labeled ‘Familiars’ he had called Steven over to check it out. Lion had sniffed it, and then walked away in disinterest to settle for a nap.

 

The boys read it, finding various names written in neat flowy handwriting that Steven recognized as his own mother’s, having seen it in her journals and her scrapbooks back at the temple.

 

Steven began to read the lists, brow furrowing as he tried to make sense of them.

_... _

_ Guinivere of England (Human)- Born: 1035 Revived: 1058 Died: 1123 Tree: Elderberry _

_ Ivan of Kievan Rus (Human)- Born: 1040 Revived: 1056 Died: 1129 Tree: Maple _

_ Bear cub in forest- Born: unknown Revived: 1120 Died: 1150 Tree: Fir _

_ … _

_ Lion #1 in Savannah- Born: unknown Revived: 1767 Died: 1783 Tree: Acacia _

_ Lion #2… _

_ Lion #3... _

 

Lars’ brow furrowed, “Are these...people she brought back to life?”

 

Steven leafed through the book, at the thousands of names, and nodded, “I think so. I remember Garnet telling me my mom could heal people with her tears...but I didn’t think she meant it like  _ this _ .”

 

“What’s the deal with the trees?”

 

Pausing in thought, Steven remembered as he perked up, “Oh! In the dimension in your head, Lion has a tree, and you have a tree….I think that means you two are the only familiars we have. I bet long ago, there was probably way more trees in there...”

 

“So where did Lion come from?”

 

Steven frowned as he leafed to the very back of the book, and saw the final listed familiar.

 

A lion cub. Three months before Steven’s birthday.

 

Looking back at Lion as he washed his paw, Steven gave a bittersweet smile to Lars, “You aren’t going to live forever. Congratulations.”

 

Lars stared at him with a mix of incredulousness and relief, putting a hand to his own chest as he felt his slow heartbeat, “So...all of this is-”

 

“Probably just a result of the magic being the thing keeping you growing now,” Steven shrugged, “Not so much the eating and sleeping.”

 

After a pause, Lars gave a weak laugh of relief, “Wow. For once I’m glad to hear that I’m going to die.”

 

“But hopefully not anytime soon,” Steven hugged him round the middle, giving a slightly concerned look back in the direction of Lion.

 

* * *

 

When Lion was nowhere to be found one morning, Steven had looked everywhere, but no trace of the animal was found.

 

For the last year or so, the animal hadn’t ventured off as far as he used to, preferring to stay around the house and sleeping near Steven’s bed. And thanks to the discovery in the desert, Steven had figured it was just Lion getting old.

 

So where  _ was _ he?

 

He wanted to just know that Lion wasn’t sick or hurt, and immediately contacted Lars, warning him he’d need to step inside his hair for a favor.

 

Upon entering the pocket dimension, Steven kept his lips pursed to save his breath as he eyed Lars’ tree, and then turned his head to face Lions’.

 

He gasped, losing all ability to breathe when he saw the acacia tree was nowhere to be seen. 

 

He didn’t even grace Lars with words when he poked his head out to breath in a sudden fit of worry, and hurried back in to search for any sign of the tree, or his familiar.

 

He stood in the spot where it once grew, stored mementos and memories strewn on the ground, nearly lost in the grass.

 

When Steven climbed out of Lars’ head a final time, he was in tears. Lars immediately asked what happened.

 

Lion was gone.

* * *

 

 

Steven had admitted to Lars that he knew this was coming, as they sat on the beach later that evening, admiring their handiwork of their makeshift memorial to Lion out of old lumber and sticks from the Lion Lickers that the animal had devoured.

 

“When we got back from the desert, I looked up the average lifespans for lions. It’s like...only 14 years. I’m 15 and a half now.”

 

“...I thought you were ten,” Lars admitted with a weak laugh in an attempt to cheer the boy up, pulling him into a side hug, and rubbing his back in an awkward attempt to comfort him.

 

“...I’m selfish,” Steven looked ahead at the sunset, “When we were in the desert, looking for information, I secretly hoped we’d find out that Lion was immortal and that...well...you were too.”

 

Lars kept quiet as he looked down at the other, in contemplative silence to show that he was listening.

 

“I know it hurts...to think you’ll live alone someday and watch everyone leave you...but I would have still had you guys and the gems,” Steven laughed weakly, “I’ve lost Lion, and I’m gonna lose you too someday.”

 

Rubbing his eyes, he glanced up to Lars, “I don’t want to lose people. Is that selfish?”

Lars looked at him a moment, then sighed, “No. That’s just being human.”

 

 

* * *

 

Two months later, Steven stared at Lars in awe as the teen held out the squirming kitten in his arms that he introduced as Steven’s early birthday present, “Where did you get him?!”

 

“That doesn’t matter,” Lars waved off, “What does matter is he’s pink and naked and wrinkly, and now you get to live with this masterpiece of nature.”

 

“I didn’t even know hairless cats were a thing!”, Steven cooed as he cradled the tiny animal.

 

“I didn’t either. I looked up ‘pink cats’ online, and these uggos were the first thing to come up.”

 

Steven gasped, “Don’t you call him that! He’s beautiful and pink and he will be loved the entire time he walks this earth.”

 

He gave the animal a little kiss, “And his name is going to be Lars.”

* * *

 

 

Musing it over, Steven considered himself lucky in that he could live forever young so long as he felt young.

 

Even when he slowly watched all his friends grow old and fade away into memories, he never lost his youthful heart if he could help it.

 

Lars had gotten his wish. To live as he wanted among his friends and the rest of humanity. He’d found a lover, started a life with them, aged gracefully, grown old and died peacefully. Steven had smiled through his tears. He missed him terribly. Even years later.

 

Standing in the clearing, he gazed around at the ring of mismatched trees; his grove of familiars.

 

They were beautiful.

 

 


End file.
